EFFECT OF TEACHERS BEHAVIOR IN TEACHING AND LEARNING IN SOME SELECTED SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN IDO-OSI LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA OF EKITI STATE

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Behavior is a description of observable outcome of teacher and student performance in different activities of institutions. Behavior may be positive or negative and effective or ineffective. Effective behavior produces the requisite results. Behavior is an action, which is different at different time. There are three types of behavior, thinking, feeling and doing. Mostly behavior is also known as cognitive, affective and psychomotor.

Psychomotor behaviors are those involving the learner, in some kind of muscular activity.

The way in which the teacher allocates time to spend on academic content affects student achievement. Good classroom management is a skill that can lead to high student achievement. It involves planning effectively, establishing rules that are reasonable and not excessive in number, and arranging the classroom so that instruction goes smoothly. Skills that are necessary for maintaining a well-managed classroom include group alerting, wittiness, overlapping, using the principle of least intervention, and creating smooth transitions.

A good teacher is expected to be committed to his work, would have the ability to take the initiative. Teacher’s personality in the attitudinal sense is a significant factor in teacher’s behavior and it has great impact on student’s achievement. The teachers as a professional must know the art of communication, understanding others and ability to learn from the experiences. They should be able to facilitate learning effectively.

Education is now universally recognized to be prime key of moral, cultural, political and socio-economic development of a nation. The nations, which have been taken major initiatives, made revolutionary advances and performed miracles in the last decades. No doubt, this great achievement is based on their effective educational system, Ahmad. It is stated “educational system of any country can provide the guarantee of success and prosperity for their nations”. The achievement of a comprehensive and effective educational system is necessary for the survival of nation.

Educational system particularly, teachers bring the qualitative change and raise the standards of education which ensures the welfare, progress and prosperity of the nation. For this purpose, teachers are prepared professionally and develop these competencies in teacher training institutions.

No system of education is better than his personnel and no system of education above the standard of its teacher. It means, the quality of any system depends upon the standard of its personnel. If the personnel are well qualified, well trained and have effective behavior, the organization will achieve its objectives successfully. Particularly the leader of the institution can improve the quality of their teachers and students with his effective behavior.

Teachers who possess professional and interpersonal skills are more effective in their classrooms in terms of student’s behavior, attitude and achievement. Every individual has a variety of attitudes, which might be positive or negative and can vary according to their favorability and un-favorability for various attitudinal objects. Professional attitude serves in many valuable ways and knowing these attitudes can also serve a lot.

Behavior is a response which an individual shows to his environment at different times. Various authors have defined it in different words: Allport (1989) stated that “the meaning of behavior is conduct or carry oneself or behavior is what we do, especially in response to outside stimuli”.

UNESCO (1986) documented that “anything that an organism does that involves action and response to stimulation”. Joyce (1980) also defined that “behavior is lawful and subject to variables in the environment”. He further defined that “behavior is an observable, identifiable phenomenon”.

The pedagogical cycle describes the interaction between the teacher and students. The four steps of the cycle are (a) structure, (b) question, (c) respond (d) react. The structure must give students a clear understanding of what they are expected to learn. Both higher- order and lower -order questions should be asked by the teacher. Teachers need to remember to wait 3 to 5 second after asking a question (wait time 1) and before reacting to a student answer (wait time 2). Teachers also need to be thoughtful in the way in which they react to student comments. Generally teachers react by using praise, acceptance, remediation, or criticism in responding to the student.

Four models of instruction that can lead to high student achievement include

direct teaching

cooperative learning

mastery learning

project based instruction

The principles of direct teaching include daily review, presentation of new material in a clear manner, guided practice, teacher feedback, independent practice, and weekly and monthly review.

In a cooperative learning classroom, students work in small groups and rewards are based on the entire group’s performance.

Mastery learning programs involve a specific objective that must be met, as indicated by assessment. Typically students work at their own pace, going on to new material only when mastery previous work has been demonstrated. Teachers often play a central role in content and skill mastery.

Project based instruction stimulates students to explore authentic issues. Individually and in small groups, student cross-traditional subject boundaries as they investigate real-life problems and demonstrate what they have learned.

Teaching involves two distinct sets of skills. The first is speaking ability. The second is interpersonal skills. Such skills allow one to create the sort of warm, close relationships with one’s students that motivate them to work independently. To become an excellent instructor, one must be outstanding in one of these sets of skills and at least competent in the other.

Teaching consists of leading the learner through a sequence of statements and restatements of a problem or body of knowledge that increases the learner’s ability to grasp, transform and transfer what he is learning.

However, Balogun D.A et al (1981) says of teaching that; It is the passing of knowledge, ideas and skills, attitudes, beliefs and feelings to someone with the aim of bringing about particular changes in the person. The changes should then lead to different behaviors. Teaching also provides the necessary amount and the kind of practice so that the changes become part of a person’s life.

From the various definitions of teaching, it is undisputable fact that teaching involves helping someone else learn something; the teaching therefore possesses certain competence such as knowledge of what he wants to teach competency in the content area; knowledge of how to present the content to the learner taking into the consideration of his age, interest, ability-competence in pedagogy. The possession of ability to maintain the type of relationship and environment that will enable the learner acquired the content is another competence called rational competence.

Learning on the other hand has many competitive definitions. However the divergence in the definition concept has some skills and competency, the skills can be acquired consciously or unconsciously and they may be in a formal educational environment or in a non-formal situation.

STATEMENT OF PROBLEM

It is very important to find the characteristic of teacher’s behavior, attitude, knowledge, skills and its impact on the academic achievement of the secondary school students, in Ekiti. Therefore, at the secondary school level teachers positive behavior, interaction, teaching experience, good laboratory equipment, student’s own capabilities and the school environment all plays a critical role for strengthening the potential required for better academic achievement of secondary school students. Teachers should be able to facilitate learning effectively.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The study sought to determine the effect of teachers behavior in teaching and learning in some selected secondary schools in Ido-Osi Local Government Area of Ekiti State. Based on the findings, recommendations were made that were anticipated would guide teachers and students to enhance academic performance in chemistry.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

It is very important to find the characteristics of teacher’s behavior, attitudes, knowledge, skills and its impact on the academic achievement of students. Therefore, at secondary level teacher’s positive behavior, interaction with students, professional competencies, teaching skills, parental involvement, students own capabilities and school environment, all play critical role for strengthening the potential required for better academic achievement of students. So present study was designed to sort out the relationship between teacher’s behavior and academic achievement of secondary school students in Ido-Osi local government area of Ekiti state. The study has significance for both future professional practice and further research for other levels. The results of this study explore information that would enable school administrators and helping the teachers to achieve skills, needed to succeed. Students may use the results to increase their understanding of what types of study habits and organizational skills are important for academic achievement. This research may provide a pavement for future research studies in the same field.

RESEARCH OBJECTIVES

Specifically the study intend:

To examine the academic achievement of the secondary students as a result of teachers behavior.

To find out the extent attitude and competencies of chemistry teachers affects the reality of the classroom.

To find out the extent chemistry laboratory affects student’s academic performance in public secondary schools and recommend strategies for improvement of teacher’s behavior.